Once Upon A Time In The City Of South City
by DragonPeaceEnvoy
Summary: What might happen if Vincent of BatB were to meet the two bishounen Piccolo and Son Goku? (Here, No YaOI.)
1. Chapter One

"Once Upon A Time, In The City Of South City" (A Beauty and The Beast/DragonBallZ Crossover) by Crossover Peace Envoy  
  
Disclaimers: (1) I did Not create "Beauty And The Beast" AKA BatB AKA BATB; that was the work of a man named Ron Koslow with some help from Ron Perlman, Linda Hamilton, the entire acting cast, Republic Pictures, and various other persons. (2) Also, I did Not create "DragonBallZ" or any of the other forms of DragonBall (original series, GT, etcetera). Those were the works of a man named Akira Toriyama, with possibly some help from whatever manga co-makers and/or animation-technician staff, voice-actors, etcetera, with whom he worked.  
  
It should be so very painfully obvious, that this is fanfiction, and that I do not collect any money nor any other sorts of payment for my writing.  
  
Ron Koslow and Akira Toriyama deserve monetary profit from their labors, so if you wish to pay anyone, just buy more of their cinematic materials, anime, or manga.  
  
Warning: even writing a crossover of DBZ with BatB is an artistically dangerous and adventurous thing to do. I have heard of crossing-over BatB with Quantum Leap; I have even read Lee Kirkland's excellent "Quantum Beast" fanfic series. I have also heard some people wanting to cross-over DBZ with Final Fantasy VII so that Piccolo and/or those Saiya-jins can interact with Vincent Valentine. I have decided to take crossovers to the next level: an intergenerational cross-over, the fanfic counterpart to an album or CD made by a collaboration between the Dust Brothers and the Rolling Stones, or of Pearl Jam with Willie Nelson, or of (if you actually wish to be very vulgar and crude) of Eminem with Country Joe And The Fish! (Did you ever hear of Country Joe's cheer-lead? He and his band The Fish were the Eminems of the hippie generation!) This is Not for the squeamish at heart, but only for people who desire a walk on the wild side, such as BatB mothers who want to read stories that their DBZ sons might also want to read; or females (You Know who you are!) who want to drool over a drop- dead-gorgeous-sexy (d-d-g-s) prince with a cape and fangs and high IQ, and happily learn that there are at least Two men of that description, and Neither are vampires of any sort! (Both Vinny and Picco are noteworthy pleasers of us females!)  
  
Also, I do Not write YaOI. (sorry, ladies) I think that the juxtaposition of Vin and Pic to be sexy enough, so there is no need to alienate any male readers with anything explicit. (Most of us women don't like it when males get into Yuri, so I 'm not about to do anything as explicit a YaOI.)  
  
Sorry that I had to use such a Long list of warnings and disclaimers; now, on with the story.....  
  
"Once Upon A Time, In The City Of South City" Chapter One (0) "Well, Actually In The City Of New York; The Past Is Prologue" he (A/N: The Dating System in DBZ is not the same as in BatB or in current real-life; its B.C.E. and C.E./A..D. locate its zero somewhere in the Middle Ages of our Dating System. I can only guess, based on hearsay, that DBZ would be put somewhere in the middle of the 21st Century of our Dating System, give-or-take about fifty years; hence, I needed to invent the terms ADS and NEDS. Also, Vincent the Lion-Faced Man must have an incredibly strong constitution, so he ages very slowly, possibly more slowly than his offspring and descendants—but that is a separate story and very tragic, unless the slow-ageing genes in Vincent and his offspring are strongly- dominant genes, and that's still a separate story. The Great Mutation is something I theorize that occurred somewhere after the 20th Century and before the character Son Goku was born. In the G.M., what living things were either very rare or nonexistent, such as talking animals with the gift of humanoid intelligence and reasoning, and the odd cases of people with *naturally* pink, or violet/purple, or bright blue, or bright green, or very bright orange hair—these weird things became rather commonplace in the short course of weeks or even a couple years. So why is Vincent still hiding-out in the Secret Place??? Old habits die hard, both his old habits, and the old habits of other people, both Tunnel-Worlders and Top- Siders.)  
  
In the usual place, where Son Gohan and Piccolo are known to spar, partly for practice of several valuable warrior skills, and partly for fun, Gohan asked Piccolo an interesting question, if Otherworld (sometimes humorously and cornily called "the Other Dimension") would allow Son Goku (Gohan's father) back for a few days' or maybe a couple weeks' of vacation, or would one or two days' of vacationing be tops? Piccolo answered in a way that suggests a very practical mind: "Who knows, but maybe the mind of the Infinite?" (The question was practical, and Piccolo's decision to not utter the name of the infinite G-d was respectful.) Eventually those two, and others, found out.  
  
Meanwhile, in a place somewhere far below the streets of a city that had simultaneously several legally-valid names, including "The Big Apple" and "NYC", a man whose face suggested in its features that he was part primate (specifically human) and part feline (specifically leonine), and looked not a day over forty-five (45), though he was actually over a hundred, easily, spoke to two of his fellow subterranean-cave-dwellers. This ancient, amber- maned cat-man had an inconvenient habit of still speaking archaicly, which was the manner of his childhood. For example, he still referred to a by- gone era the "Twentieth Century", using an old timeline known as the ADS (Ancient Dating System) instead of the more current NEDS (New Earth Dating System). (It was often difficult for his conversational partners to understand what particular year he was referring to, because "year zero" (0) in ADS had happened thousands of years ago, whereas the "zero" in NEDS had occurred only a few centuries ago. Figuring out the exact date was only slightly more simple a mathematical act than converting miles into kilometers or inches into centimeters; yet, that was the man's style of recounting historical past, or his own biographical past.) The stories he told were interesting, though; also, more importantly, they all had the ring of truth : for Vincent had the habit of Always Telling The Truth When He Discusses Something Vital. He only withheld true information only when someone innocent's life or dignity or liberty or posterity depended on it ! Other tunnel-dwellers, especially those in a small area known as "The Secret Place" weren't able to get enough of history, as told by Vincent: if anyone understood the tunnel-world history, traditions, and culture, it was a man who looked like a beast, and was sometimes called a Beast by his enemies, but by far was the most-Unbeastlike man alive.  
  
Son Goku was allowed to return to the Land Of The Living, specifically a planet called Earth, or Terra, or other names; the planet were he spent his childhood, ever since the day his life-pod had crash-landed onto the planet's surface several decades ago. "They allowed me to return for two or three weeks!" Goku exclaimed with ebullient joy, "Those bureaucrats, and King Yemma, have agreed with us that several weeks' vacation to meet loved ones was actually a good idea! Now, where do we go? Seattle? Kyoto? Somewhere else?" He and the Z-team, including Piccolo, finally all agreed to vacation in a North-American city; it was a nasty city to live in, but at least it was not so boring a vacation-spot as South City (also known as Satan City), the most banal city on earth was : at least the North American city was not as humdrum or lackluster as Satan City !! So, off to North America they all went ......  
  
Goku and Piccolo and the Z-team and their families had been vacationing in a city on the North American Landmass that still goes by the old name New York City, although by now it also answers to some three or four other names, all of them legally valid just like the old appellation. Another common moniker was "The Big Apple", a very affectionate and humorous name for a city!!! They were both enjoying the fact that Goku was allowed a three-week vacation from Otherworld, another place with multiple names, including the very numinous name "The Afterlife" and the very silly- sounding "The Other Dimension"! Goku was very happy to see his family and go see parts of Planet Earth that he had passed through on several occasions, but had never got familiar with. He decided that it was time to start vacationing in the Western Hemisphere of Earth, and the others all agreed. They also agreed that New York City was a good start, although Washington, D.C. and Seattle and Austin, Texas were also good ideas. But only one city per vacation, so Goku had to narrow down his choices to only one city: N.Y.C., also known as New York City.  
  
A few days later, the evening of the first day in which the entire Z-team and their families had started vacationing in "New Yawk", far beneath the streets of that same city: "Well, I'm going off on my nightly walk," Vincent announced softly to a couple of his fellow Secret-Placers. Many times they had tried to tell him that, ever since The Great Mutation in which animals, including lions, had become persons gifted with the powers or talents of reasoning and speech and upright bipedal locomotion : it was now safer for Vincent to walk in the daytime ! Old habits, such as nocturnal strolling, died hard; and Vin, as some affectionately called him, usually took offence at the suggestion that he was a mere animal simply gifted with the Three Talents (bipedal locomotion and the two others), so they let Vincent go on his nightly routine, so off Vincent went .  
  
Piccolo and Goku took a walk through the infamous Central Park, these two mighty men, feeling more and more fatigued with each step and somehow believing it were merely because of the hour of the evening; it was, after all, very close to the usual time they tended to fall asleep. They were not aware that some group of fools had managed to magically wish back to life the eternally sworn enemies of Son Goku and the Prince Named Piccolo AKA "Ma Junior". Several enemies had been so quiet as to even escape Piccolo's superhumanly sensitive ears. "Long time, no see!" an extremely malevolent high-pitched voice growled from behind. Goku and Piccolo turned around to face the source of that miserable voice, and the source was in fact a known former inmate of Hell: FREEZA!!!!!!!!! and several others, King Kold (Freeza's/Furiza's father), Cell (AKA Seru), and several others whom Goku and Piccolo can easily recognize, and several whom they cannot so easily recognize.....(To Be Continued...) 


	2. Chapter Two

"Once Upon A Time, In The City Of South City" (A Beauty and The Beast/DragonBallZ Crossover) by Crossover Peace Envoy  
  
Disclaimers: (1) I did Not create "Beauty And The Beast" AKA BatB AKA BATB; that was the work of a man named Ron Koslow with some help from Ron Perlman, Linda Hamilton, the entire acting cast, Republic Pictures, and various other persons. (2) Also, I did Not create "DragonBallZ" or any of the other forms of DragonBall (original series, GT, etcetera). Those were the works of a man named Akira Toriyama, with possibly some help from whatever manga co-makers and/or animation-technician staff, voice-actors, etcetera, with whom he worked.  
  
It should be so very obvious, that this is fanfiction, and that I do not collect any money nor any other sorts of payment for my writing.  
  
Ron Koslow and Akira Toriyama deserve to profit from their labors, so if you wish to pay anyone, just buy more of their cinematic, anime, or manga, works.  
  
Warning: writing a crossover of DBZ with BatB is a dangerous, and difficult thing to do. This is Not for the squeamish at heart, but only for the very Adventurous, such as BatB mothers who want to read stories that their DBZ sons might also want to read; or females (you Know who you are) who are willing to drool over a drop-dead-gorgeous-sexy (d-d-g-s) prince with a cape and fangs and high IQ, and happily learn that there are at least *Two* men of that description, and Neither are vampires of any sort! (Both Vinny and Picco are noteworthy pleasers of us females!)  
  
Also, I do Not write YaOI. (sorry, ladies) I think that the juxtaposition of Vin and Pic to be sexy enough, so there is no need to alienate any male readers with anything explicit. (Most of us women don't like it when males get into Yuri, so I 'm not about to do anything as explicit a YaOI.)  
  
Sorry that I had to use such a Long list of warnings and disclaimers; now, on with the story.....  
  
"Once Upon A Time, In The City Of South City" (Well, Actually In The City Of New York)  
  
(A/N: The two Dating Systems, ADS and NEDS, are explained in the beginning of the previous chapter, along with The Great Mutation, and some theories as to how Vincent has lived so long. Here, I must make no further notes, because I don't wish to spoil a surprise.)  
  
Goku and Piccolo and the Z-team and their families had been vacationing in a city on the North American Landmass that still goes by the old name New York City, although by now it also answers to some three or four other names, all of them legally valid just like the old appellation. Another common moniker was "The Big Apple", a very affectionate and humorous name for a city!!! They were both enjoying the fact that Goku was allowed a three-week vacation from Otherworld--another place with multiple names, including: the very numinous name "The Afterlife" and the very silly- sounding (like something translated by FUNimation)-- "The Other Dimension"! Goku was very happy to see his family and go see parts of Planet Earth that he had passed through on several occasions, but had never got familiar with. He decided that it was time to start vacationing in the Western Hemisphere of Earth, and the others all agreed. They also agreed that New York City was a good start, although Washington, D.C. and Seattle and Austin, Texas were also good ideas. But only one city per vacation, so Goku had to narrow down his choices to only one city: N.Y.C. !!!  
  
They took a walk through the infamous Central Park, these two mighty men, feeling more and more fatigued with each step and somehow believing it were merely because of the hour of the evening; it was, after all, very close to the usual time they tended to fall asleep. They were not aware that some group of hopeless fools had managed to magically wish back to life the eternally sworn enemies of Son Goku and the Prince Named Piccolo AKA "Ma Junior". Several enemies had been so quiet as to even escape Piccolo's superhumanly sensitive ears. "Long time, no see!" an extremely malevolent high-pitched voice growled from behind. Goku and Piccolo turned around to face the source of that miserable voice, and the source was in fact a known former inmate of Hell: FREEZA!!!!!!!!! and several others: King Kold (Freeza's/Furiza's father), Cell (AKA Seru), and several others whom Goku and Piccolo can easily recognize, and several whom they cannot so easily recognize.....  
  
The unknowns included an eldery-looking man with a long nose and a golden covering worn over one side of his face, Phantom-of-the-Opera-Style; a man with a skinny face and a twisted thin-lipped grin whose face resembled movie-characters played by James Woods or Christopher Walken or Lance Henriksen or Peter Weller (on a Very bad day), or even of supporting actor named Stephen McHattie. There was a couple other guys, one who responded to the name "Mitch" or "Bitch", and he appeared half-mad; and a guy nicknamed "Stephen" or "Big-Bass", and he was apparently even creepier than "Mitch", and he was creepy in a dominating sort of way; and still two others whom the entire gang referred to (with a strong degree of loathing) as simply "The Hollow Men" whose manners suggested arrogant spoiled rich boys who obviously did not value the lives of others. ("The Hollow Men" carried knives, likely were the weakest, also apparently the most cowardly, and probably disgustingly sadistic! Even Furiza had some princely qualities, though only barely; but those two had none at all-------they were only low-rent henchmen!)  
  
"It is very unfortunate that you saw us," the menace who looked like Christopher Walken or James Woods or........Stephen McHattie!........quietly and coldly said to Goku and Piccolo.  
  
"Well said, my young protege," a basso-profundo voice intoned with a subtle degree of quietness, and continued rumbling from the face half-hid in the golden mask. "You know what to do, Gabriel....."  
  
The Stephen-McHattie-look-alike grabbed hold of Piccolo while the "Hollow Men" both grabbed hold of Goku. "This is a Ki-Drainer. My fatherly friend Paracelsus invented it, "Gabriel" (the"Christopher-'Walken-James-Woods- Lance-Henriksen-Stephen-McHattie-look-alike") said; he was eyeing first the old man in the gold mask, then eyeing the strange gun-like weapons held by both of the truthfully-named "Hollow Men" that were aimed at Goku and Piccolo. "We had these on all along, you were continuously shot with their strength-draining power; you're too weak to resist. We can kill you if we want to, but instead, we'll first we'll give you some warning-wounds for you to think about!" Gabriel's voice was had a constant emotionless cold command; he spoke of hateful physical cruelty with an almost-casual matter- of-factness.......  
  
Both men fell unconscious, knowing that their captors were about to "work" on them, slashing them. "Now crack two noble hearts! Good night, sweet princes!" they heard the basso-profundo voice of Paracelsus rumble rather sonorously; then they heard some of their attackers walk away happily japing about how they probably got rid of two potential threats, or had at least made them afraid to make any attempts on the little cadre, the names of its personnel Goku and Piccolo did not fully know, but will need to eventually learn: Furiza AKA Freeza; King Kold; Cell AKA Seru; several minor known hireling-henches of Furiza—such persons Goku and Piccolo recognized with some ease; but then there were the others-- those two detestable young hirelings, "The Hollow Men"; Mitch ("The Bitch") Denton; Stephen ("The Big Bass") Bass; Gabriel AKA many aliases; and the old man in the golden Phantom-of-the-Opera mask, John Pater AKA Paracelsus!!!  
  
They weren't sure of it, but the Saiya-jin and the Namekki-jin thought they had also heard someone mentioning a "Dr. Gireaux" (Dr. Gero???!!!) being sooooooooo helpful by wishing them back with....what was that?....the "Ten- Thousand-Years'-Power DragonBalls???!!!" Also, how did Dr. Gero, if that the same person as referred-to, be alive again----who would actually wish that douchebag back to life, and why? Both protagonists sought with every breath left in their fainting bodies to remember that vital information, as they succumbed to an oblivion made of half pain and half sleep: they were going into a shock both physical and emotional.......  
  
Piccolo and Goku were wallowing in their own pain, dealt to them by a combination of knife-slashes and the newly-discovered body-weakening technology called a ki-drainer. They, going in and out of half- consciousness, both managed to hear approaching soft footfalls, like the padding of a tiger in his domain within a jungle, pad, pad, pad...The two men both objected, whispering out as loud as their tortured bodies can grant as possible: "No!" "Don't cause us any trouble!" "Not now!" "NOOOOO!!!!!!!" Piccolo was the one who uttered the last objection; and then he went totally unconscious along with Goku.........(To Be Continued...) 


	3. Chapter Three

Once Upon A Time In The City Of South City: Needles and Carrots, Yuck!  
  
The usual disclaimers:  
  
I did Not create the Vincent-and-Catherine "Beauty and the Beast": Ron Koslow and a host of able actors and directors and other folk did that. I also did Not create "DragonBallZ": Akira Toriyama and possibly some helpers (mostly technical help, a little for the manga, and somewhat a little more help for the anime form)----Mr. Toriyama created that, and all the other sagas of the DragonBall multisaga (original series, Z, GT, etc......) What I am doing here is only a fanfic; I do Not seek money for this. Furthermore, if you wish to spend money, then buy these gentlemen's artistry; you can probably find BatB and DBZ on both VHS and/or DVD formats. (Ocean Group probably did a better job as an English translation than Funimation.) DBZ also can be found in the manga form. My work, a BatB-DBZ crossover, is done for free.  
  
Ladies, please don't weep with anger, but there will be no YaOI in my crossover. My reason is this: If I wrote YaOI about any of the masculine characters, then, out of fairness to the male readership (I'm hoping for a mixed audience), I would need to write Yuri for the gents, especially the young gents!  
  
I hope this crossover fanfic pleases a lot of people, and gets the BatB crowd to also appreciate DBZ, and the DBZ crowd to also appreciate BatB. I, "Crossover Peace Envoy", should be only one of many who can write convincing (Or, conVincent?) DBZ-BatB crossovers: Some day, I hope, there would be others.  
  
Alternate Chapter Title: Goku Remembers Once Being in A Hospital—Poor Goku Remembers Squicky, Revolting Things Such As Needles And Carrots, Oh Yuck; Hospitals And Needles And Carrots, Oh Yuck; Hospitals And Needles And Carrots, Oh Yuck—Sounds Kinda Like "Lions And Tigers And Bears, Oh My...Okay, I'll quit that really bad Frank Baum/Wizard-of-Oz joke...  
  
(A/N: The word "Squicky" is a relatively new slang word I had learned on the 'Net, and it's a combination of Squirmy with Icky. It means *Very* revolting or loathsome, such as the fact that needles and carrots give Goku a serious case of the Squicks, the Squirmy Icks. Urban-Dictionaries-Dot- Com was the slang dictionary of my choice. As for why some BatB characters, other than the genetically strong Vincent, get to live so long, I can only say now that in Devin's case, it is probably a combination of the proper nutrition, exercise, and lifestyle, along with some special medical technique and industrial-strength antioxidants and very good luck—he could've been poisoned by his antioxidants, or he could've developed a deathly allergy to those industrial antioxidants from constantly ingesting them in large quantities. Also, the Dating Systems, and The Great Mutation, and Vincent's incredibly slow aging. See a/n in chapters 1 and 2. How did Devin become a licenced medical doctor, and what happened to friend, Charles, "the Dragon Man"? The answer to that question and to any other question is either I am not sure yet, or I do know for sure, but I really don't like to spoil a surprise that I'm trying to cook- up. Please be patient; the details will come as needed. (~_^)...)  
  
Goku and Piccolo were phasing in and out of semi-consciousness, and Piccolo overheard various snippets of conversation:  
  
"You know, Mouse, when your ancestor of the same name was your age, he was in several ways just like you! Thank you! I miss that old man; you brought him back to me for this moment. Now: we need to bandage these two men and lay them on stretchers so I can carry them down to safety without injuring them. Even Catherine was not so mauled when I first laid eyes on her!" The voice speaking to a "Mouse" (the descendant of a previous Mouse) was a voice that had in it both the fearsome strength of a growling lion and the soft velvety gentleness of a purring kitten. Piccolo found the source of that voice to either be a potential friend or a very honorable, trustworthy, interesting foe----he wasn't sure which, as the pain of being moved and the comfort of being taken to safety seemed to had momentarily cancelled each other, and his half-sleeping mind was in no shape to go into serious bouts of reasoning and/or logic. All Piccolo can do is hope that the owner of that quasi-feline voice should prove to be a good man.  
  
Goku and Piccolo had lapsed again into complete unconsciousness, and this time, it was Goku's turn to half-wake-up into semi-consciousness. He felt something binding him all over his face, neck, head, and body: they feel like bandages. **I Hate Bandages! Bandages are used in hospitals, and hospitals serve bad food, overcooked food! They overcook the vegetables, even the ones I normally like, and they also serve the ones I hate. One hospital fed me carrots, lots and lots of carrots, cooked carrots, mushy overcooked carrots----they smelled sooooooo damn bad! Soft foods----don't the staff realize that their patients would like to Chew their food!!!! Soft foods, including soft carrots! I hate all carrots, I even hate crunchy raw carrots, but I especially hate soft, cooked carrots!!!!!!!** Goku was obsessed about thinking about his past bad experiences with hospitals and carrots, that he forgot to pay attention to what was going on around him, although he did notice that something feeling like a gurney or a stretcher was placed underneath him, and someone was busy tying that object to him, or him to that object, he can't tell which.  
  
"Now look at his face, Devin! I say he's tortured with pain! Medicate him STAT!" That was a strange-sounding voice, having some feline qualities. "I don't want to carry him when he's in such hot, burning ---!"—then the feline voice lowered to a whisper—"Look in your toolbag, Dev! Certainly you have something clean and unused to kill that damned..."—reduced to an even softer whisper—"pain! I know we don't want to overmedicate these poor men, but we don't wish the opposite, either!"  
  
The other man responded, with a raspy, gravelly, elderly-sounding voice, a stereotypical "Old Country Doctor". The "Old Doctor", probably "Devin", said something about a "syringe"-----**Hey, wait a minute, isn't a syringe a thing usually equipped with a NEEDLE on the business end???!!!!!!! NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!** But before Goku can move a muscle, something sharp had punctured his skin and went right home into his blood stream, and the sharp pain of a needle-puncture was soon replaced with a soothing numbness; so Goku lapsed into full unconsciousness......... 


	4. Chapter Four

Chapter Four of Once Upon A Time In The City Of South City  
  
(Disclaimers: I did *Not* create DragonBallZ, that was Akira Toriyama's doing; also, I did *Not* create Republic Pictures' Vincent-and-Catherine- saga Beauty-and-the-Beast, that was the doing of several other people. Also, this is a fanfic, written by a fan for the enjoyment of other fans, and perhaps some curious people here and there, *Not*Intended* for any sort of monetary profit.)  
  
(In a different **FUTURE** Crossover fanfic, there is a remote possibility that I might do even a crossover of two Beauty-Beast tales, but it may involve something as complicated as Narcissa's magic. Categorizing this hypothetical BatB-B'N'B crossover might be difficult, too; do I simply file it under Television Crossovers? Under Beauty and the Beast? Or under a third category, Cartoons, now that I am out of the Cartoon Closet and have publicly admitted on the 'Net that I Also like the cartoon BandB?)  
  
Now, back to our ongoing online fanfiction novella (and I'll not use any lame cotton-candy-versus-fresh-fruit metaphors, or other food analogies, as such talk like that could make some readers angry, or one particular fanfic authoress very hungry!):  
  
"Once Upon A Time In The City Of South City"  
  
Piccolo woke up in pain. Pain wracked him all over his seven-foot-tall, athletic, green-and-salmon-with-red-trim, Namek-jin body; from his bald, green, pointy-eared, fangy-mouthed, antennae-equipped head, all the way down his tri-colored reptilian body to his green feet. He remembered some shards and fragments of the night before: the attacks on him and his friend Goku by both unknown assailants and known enemies whom he and Goku had both killed, and some were even killed quite long ago, such as Freeza/Furiza! 'Who wished these miserable douchebags back to life?' Piccolo thought to himself, "And, could there be some sort of Dragon or genie that can wish people back to life who had been dead for decades? That's not all: I wonder who were the other guys, such as the person who invented that weapon called a "Ki-Drainer"?' Piccolo silently mused. 'Well, at least whoever scraped us off the ground in Central Park, obviously did a reasonable job at first aid....Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh' Picc's thought was ended in a paroxysm of pain, an he decided right there not to move again, at least after resting for a while, which was all he could do at the moment.  
  
Also, there was the constant racket—hundreds of background noises, not very loud by human standards, but to a Namek-jin in severe pain the noise was aggravating! Most of the background sounds were either some sort of tapping on metal pipes. 'Just how many leaky pipes do these people have, anyway? Or are they prison inmates trying to communicate to each other behind their captors' backs? Do these people, who have us tied-up in bandages, work for those idiots who used horrible new weapons on me and Goku? Oh, Kami, that's all that we need!' Picco also noticed the other species of noise: The rumbling of some sort of train—a subway, perhaps? 'Either we're not held captive in a prison,' Piccolo thought, 'or maybe the prison holding us is so horribly large, like it were owned by some powerful dictator. I don't know which. How did they transport us here? How long were we unconscious?' Picc's mind was active, questioning, and making demands that his weakened body cannot fulfill. It was tempting to fall asleep again, until...  
  
Piccolo's large pointy green ears overheard soft footfalls enter the room: pad, pad, pad, even stride, suggesting a graceful gait; pad, pad, pad, like a lion described in some of C.S. Lewis' fictional works as Gohan had once described when he was preparing a book report as a middle-school assignment. The padding went over to the bed Picc was lain upon, and the gentle growl/purr spoke to him softly: "Our people have made some soup. You have been without food and beverage for more than eight hours. I can imagine that you are both hungry."  
  
"Yes, please..." was all Piccolo could say, feeling every laceration the enemies' knives had dealt him, and the throbbing that comes partly from the cuts, and partly from the weakness dealt him by the Ki-Drainer. The weakness was so humiliating to Picc. The Namek started thinking, 'I'd better trace the person who invented that damned thing and tear him a new one....'  
  
Then Piccolo felt a spoon filled with something very warm touch his lips, requesting entry. The green warrior was already thirsty enough to say "yes" to any beverage, even something as weird as soup; so he humbly swallowed it. It surprised him, tasted home-made, like Chi-Chi would sometimes fed Goku and Gohan and himself when they were training to fight and defeat Cell/Seru. "Good soup," he said, struggling against both the pain and (the sluggishness caused by) the pain-fighting drugs, and the bandages that tied him up all over, as either some sort of physical restraint, or as a nice warm cocoon, with an opening for Piccolo's lower nose and mouth, which the stranger was busily and happily feeding with an obviously home-made soup.  
  
"I'm glad you like it; I'll tell the man who made it. His ancestor William would be so proud of him." The growl/purr gently whispered.  
  
Piccolo overheard something move from another part of the room, opposite from where the growling/purring stranger had walked in; so the Namek now knew where the door to the room is probably located. As for the something moving, Piccolo wondered, could it be Goku. Piccolo intentionally sniffed the air—phew! Saiya-jin body odor! Yup, at least Goku is in the room. If the moving thing expresses an interest in food, provoked by the smell of soup, 'Then I have a theory.....'  
  
"Mmmmmmmmmmmm, *Smells*Yummy*!" a familiar voice sounded out rather audibly. Yup, Piccolo's theory was correct—Son Goku is alive!  
  
"Goku, you woke up just in time for some home-made soup and a few kind words," Piccolo said.  
  
"From Chi-Chi?" Goku naively asked.  
  
"No, Goku, use your ears—what's that sound, do people constantly bang pipes, like they are working around the clock to fix something, or like they are trying to communicate in some sort of variant of morse-code—is that what usually happens where you live?! Do you live near a subway- tunnel? Goku, you need to know that we are being helped by some total strangers."  
  
"Well, I'm still happy to know that we're not in a hospital," Goku chirped, "And thank you for everything, including the soup."  
  
"Don't mention it," the feline growl/purr gently replied. "But I must confess, that while you are not in any *Above*ground hospital, you are still in the Infirmary unit of my people's....*pauses a half-second too long*....'village', if I can use that word." Goku was too busy slurping-up whatever the spoon held to have noticed what the stranger had said, but Piccolo noticed, and he made a mental note of the precise verbiage. The stranger was trying to not let him or Goku in on too much.  
  
'Okay, this stranger is capable of both kindness and secretiveness. This can get very...*Interesting*' Picc thought to himself. He kept his thoughts to himself to ponder when the stranger was out of the room and when Goku had stopped those very unpleasant sounds of eating, no, actually *Inhaling* the soup fed to him. All of that done, Picco then realized that he was too tired, too drugged-up, too wracked with pain all-over, and too—gasp!!!—too *Weak*! To remain awake any longer would be foolishness; might as well sleep again right now..... 


End file.
